A proposed green market on the Upper East Side has bought the farm – thanks to a scorched-earth campaign by high-end grocer Eli Zabar and some local residents.

Community Board 8 had voted last month to allow eight vendors to sell fruit, vegetables and cheese in the playground of PS 6 at East 82nd Street and Madison Avenue for a few hours on Saturdays.

But despite the vote, Tom Strumolo, of the Council on the Environment of New York, said yesterday he decided to seek another location after a meeting with residents.

“They were very adamantly opposed,” he said. “I was led to believe they would picket” the site.

“I didn’t want my growers to be subjected to that sort of behavior,” he said. “They have trusted me for many, many years to bring them into a place where they will be welcome.”

Zabar, who owns E.A.T. on Madison between 80th and 81st streets and Eli’s on Third and 80th Street, has been a vocal opponent.

He contended “that he’s trying to run a business and they would compete with his business,” said Board 8 President David Liston.

Pamela Matson, who has two children at PS 6, complained Zabar “owns the neighborhood.”

“I would love a green market,” she said. “A green market here is no messier than the kids.”

But a mother of two children at the school, who asked not to be identified, was afraid a market would being rodents.

“That was my first thought,” she said. “It would tear up the schoolyard. Let them use another school.”

Other residents complained a market would cause litter and traffic problems.

Liston was disappointed in the decision. He said the board’s vote reflected its conviction that “the parade of horrors described by those opposed to the green market was simply not a real or substantial risk.”

The board, he said, felt that “Eli Zabar will be just fine even with farmers selling their produce a few hours a week.”

Zabar was in Europe and could not be reached for comment.

Glenn McAnanama, a member of the group that supported the school playground location, said that he was “very disappointed. I think it’s a loss to the neighborhood.”

“The funny thing was at the [community board’s] subcommittee hearing [Zabar] said, ‘Can I sell the stuff that I grow on my rooftop at the green market?’ ”